#4 of the Top Five Stand Alone Sci-Fi Movies

The Celluloid Highways #4 pick - INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS (Don Siegel, USA, 1956)

Jack Finney’s novel (serialised in Collier’s magazine) became one of the keynote American science-fiction films when it was adapted for the screen by Daniel Mainwaring and brought to visual life by journeyman director Don Siegel. Siegel was a director of outstanding generic utility, putting his hand to most genres in his long and esteemed career. This would be his only entry in the science-fiction genre, but it has proved to be among his most important and pervasive films. Its importance lies in that fact that every successive generation has taken the themes established in Siegel’s film and applied them to the socio/political concerns of the day. The Phillip Kaufman remake in 1978 for example updated the themes of the original for the post-Watergate generation, but undid itself by overstating the paranoia. Siegel’s film has a greater subtlety and builds its paranoia slowly and surely. The disturbing aspects of the tale slowly creep up on you, in a manner similar to that experienced by Dr. Miles J. Bennell (Kevin McCarthy). Bennell is initially at least the skeptical expert, a man of science and rationality who seeks logical answers to the strange changes in behavior that have been directed to his attention. Science-fiction films of the 1950’s often took the side of either the logic of science and its experts or the brute efficiency of a military response. Here both institutions are found wanting, the military being all but invisible and science being ineffectual. Instead the citizens of small town America who have been duplicated by alien beings who are able to duplicate exactly our cellular structure are able to establish a rule of thumb that deceives outsiders and leads to the hounding and eventual demise of our heroes. What truly makes this film a terrifying statement is the manner in which it dramatizes the nightmarish (but logical) extension of community and consensus - a town of faceless automatons without a single bone of radicalism in their bodies. If one film sums up the uncertainties of 1950’s American then Invasion of the Body Snatchers is it. A truly radical and in places subversive example of science-fiction.

The Film Connoisseur's #4 pick - METROPOLIS (Fritz Lang, Germany, 1927)

Fritz Lang’s masterpiece of German Expressionism is still one of my all time favorite science fiction films of all time. Metropolis is on this countdown for more then one reason. First; its production values. This film was the most expensive silent film ever made! And you see every single penny up on screen. There is genuine artistry in the way this film was brought to life. Intricate miniatures, detailed mate paintings, hundreds of extras and elaborate sets are part of the combination that brought the futuristic vistas of Metropolis to life. One look at the scene where all the workers are slaving away at the “M-Machine” lets us understand the awesomeness of the visuals that Fritz Lang conjured up with his vision. But, this films merits don’t only include technical ones. Yes it is an astonishing film to look at, and yes it has been influential on everything from Star Wars to Dark City, but one of the reasons I hold this film in such high regard is that, like any good science fiction film, this one is a mirror of society. It addresses important themes that mirror the suffering that the working class was going through during the dawning of the great depression. The films themes speak of the unification between the work force and its employers. One can’t exist without the other. In the film, Freder, the son of a wealthy business man, sees the suffering that the poor people are going through and decides to join their ranks and work side by side with them. Even though it was made in 1927, and it is a silent film, its images are too powerful to ignore or forget. It was a film that was way ahead of its time, every time I watch I wonder how the hell they shot such an amazing film in 1927, when visual effects where in diapers. The existing print of this movie has many scenes missing, but thankfully, a lot of it was recovered! It was discovered in a film vault in Buenos Aires! Kino Video (the same guys who released the existing copy of the film) is going to be releasing a new cut of this film, with 25 minutes of footage that had previously been considered lost forever! So be on the look out for that. Metropolis remains a timeless classic that every true lover of films should see at some point.

#5 Top Five Stand Alone Sci-Fi Movies

On this Top Five Stand Alone Sci-Fi Movies Countdown I worked in collaboration with fellow blogger Shaun Anderson from the excellent blog The Celluloid Highway. We decided to do this countdown and include our top five choices for best stand alone sci-fi movie. What this means is, we left out all sci-fi films that are part of a saga (like Star Wars or Star Trek) and we left out all those that have sequels, which is the ONLY reason why I left out my favorite science fiction film ever: 2001: A Space Odyssey. 

It was really tough for me to come up with a top five best stand alone sci-fi's because there are a lot of good ones. It would have been easier to do a top 10, but that would take forever so we stuck with a top five. What we will do with this countdown is Shaun and I will give our choices for top five, one every day of the week starting today, so today we will present you guys with our #5, tomorrow our #4 until we reach our #1 choices on Friday. So stick around, follow our countdown and comment! 

Dont forget to visit Shaun's blog The Celluloid Highway, its one of the best written blogs on the blogosphere, according to me. So without further ado, I present to you my dear readers our #5 starting with: 

The Celluloid Highway's pick for #5 is: DUNE (David Lynch, USA, 1984)

Cult director David Lynch suddenly found himself legitimized with Oscar nominations after his weird Victorian fable of acceptance and tolerance The Elephant Man (1980). Few would have predicted that three years later he would be helming a science-fiction monstrosity filmed on several continents with a team of hundreds of technicians, actors and studio representatives. Frank Herbert’s novel Dune (the first book in a long series) had proved too challenging a task for Chilean director Alejandro Jodorowsky, and despite his failure to get the project off the ground (which should have been a warning to anyone else) Italian super producer Dino De Laurentis and his daughter Raffaella were still willing to raise the $45,000,000 the film would cost. The result was a film doomed to commercial failure (few films would have recouped such a huge budget) and critical indifference bordering on utter confusion. Years later without the baggage of its production, promotion and eventual reception Dune emerges as a daring and thoughtful film that regularly drifts into the dark avant-garde territory explored in Lynch’s excellent debut feature Eraserhead (1977). Lynch still manages to convey a sense of urban and industrial alienation through the weirdly organic production designs of Anthony Masters and shows he is also adept at handling the conventions and expectations of the generic structure he found himself within. With a cast that includes Francesca Annis, Brad Dourif, Freddie Jones, Kyle MacLachlan (making his film debut and looking quite nervous), Virginia Madsen, Jurgen Prochnow, Max Von Sydow and a semi naked Sting, with a soundtrack by Toto (remember the hit song ‘Africa’?) and Brian Eno Dune is a truly trans-global production that has suffered continual misinterpretation. The film abounds with political allegories, thematic depth, and obscure symbolism. But ultimately it was unable to live up to the rich tapestry of imagery and epic breadth of Herbert’s source novel.

The Film Connoisseurs pick for #5 is - A.I. ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE (Steven Spielberg, USA, 2001)

This Spielberg film was one that Stanley Kubrick had been wanting to make for the longest time. Kubrick had been planning it and planning it for years and years, at times getting close to filming the thing, but then not. Other projects seem to always get in the way. Sadly, time went by and Kubrick passed away. As a way to honor this legendary director, Steven Spielberg decided to take all of Kubricks pre-production plans for A.I. and finally direct Kubrick's dream project. I think Kubrick would have been proud! This movie is epic. It plays with many of the themes that Kubrick loved to play with in his movies, like for example the dynamics between humans and computers. Will technology ever replace or outlive human beings? This film presents us with a world populated with androids. They pretty much look and act as human beings would. The world is divided between those humans that welcome artificial intelligence into their lives, and those who condemn it. Some see artificial intelligence as a threat to humanity and everything humans stand for. Haley Joel Osment plays David, a boy android that is brought into a family of humans to fill the void made by the hospitalization of their human son Martin, who is in a coma and looks as if he will stay that way for a while. David looks and acts like a real little boy, and the parents are happy. Problem comes when their real son suddenly wakes up from the coma and ends up returning home. Martin cannot get along with David. After a series of problems between the two boys, the mother decides to set David free into the world, so she abandons him in the middle of nowhere. From here on in, the movie is all about David searching for his creator, searching for the truth of it all. I love the symbolisms in this movie. A.I. is one of those movies that covers the life span of a character from birth to death, the only thing is that David doesn’t die. He is a robot, and as long as his battery lasts, he will continue functioning for eons. I like the fact that he is always on the search for his creator, symbolizing that search for God that we all end up going through at one point or another in our lives. In this sense, the film has elements from another one of my all time favorite science fiction films: Blade Runner. A.I. also has elements from Pinocchio, because David is looking for a way to become a real boy. Will David ever meet his God? What is the truth behind it all? Visually, this film is stunning! It has some gloriously beautiful moments and it is also touching and emotional journey, thanks to Spielberg who has always loved dwelling on the emotional resonance of things.

  Well, thats it for today. Dont forget to check back tomorrow for our #4 choice for Stand Alone Sci-Fi films. Hope you are enjoying the countdown!

Who is The Film Connoisseur?

The Film Connoisseur himself, Francisco Gonzalez

Hello to all my readers out there! I’m happy to see the blog steadily growing in readership! We now have 77 readers! I will continue writing movie reviews for as long as I can, and keep this blog running, with interesting articles and movie reviews for your reading enjoyment. We've had more than 150 posts so far! I hope you haven’t gotten to bored with my reviews and articles up to this point, and if you have any suggestions or comments, let me know below with a comment, or write me an e-mail and let me know how this blog can improve. I want to know how I can keep you guys happy! Thanks to all the regular readers, those who comment and read on a regular basis: I salute you!

I thought Id take the opportunity to let you guys know a little bit about who I am, and what I do when I’m not blogging. I have a regular job just like the next guy, but whenever I’m not earning my paycheck, I’m making movies. I enjoy writing and directing my own films. I had been making short films ever since I was about 11 or 12. Getting my two brothers to be on them, hell, I even got my grandmother to appear in one of them! Time went buy, and my love for films never died. I watched movies voraciously, learning as much as I could about he process. So I decided to jump into it full scale. For the last 5 years I have been involved in making my independently financed films. Both writing and directing.

I have made to full length features. The first one, Cannabis Cannibal, is a film about four regular dopes who have to suddenly face the ever growing zombie threat. Its about those first few moments when you find out the world is being overrun by zombies. Then we made the sequel, Cannabis Cannibal Exodus, which was a bit more epic in scale. The zombies have taken over the island of Puerto Rico, and our four protagonists have to escape the island before the government blows it up with nukes. I live in Puerto Rico (that’s a small Island on the Caribbean) so I make my movies in Spanish, for a Puerto Rican audience, but non the less, I thought you guys might find it interesting to know a bit about the movies we make. I say “we” because filmmaking is truly a collaborative effort, and I recognize this whole heartedly.

A day after we shot on this location, The Men Who Stare at Goats shot some scenes on this location as well! Ewan McGregor and George Clooney were running about on the same location we shot our little film in!

Both films were met with the audiences approval, people went to see them both, the last one (Exodus) was actually premiered in a movie theater! It was one of the coolest days of my life to see an audience laughing and enjoying our film.

My films are very low budget productions, we have no pretentions. We know we are “guerilla” style, we know we make a film with very little. And until a producer comes along and gives us a couple of million dollars, we keep making our films our own way. A handy cam, lots of natural light and lots of friends for actors and crew. That’s basically it. But the end results are surprisingly entertaining. And no matter how low budget it is, our films are still just that. Films. They tell a story, they might be low budget, but they are a mirror of what we live through in our lives. It’s an artistic representation of ourselves through art. Plus we have a blast making them as well. We entertain each other.

We used an old abandoned hospital to make the world look post-apocalyptic.

Since we don’t have money to build sets or anything, we choose our locations carefully, making sure we can maximize the illusion we are trying to create. For example, our last movie was a post apocalyptic one, but we simply shot in really messed up neighborhoods and made it look like it was the end of the world. We shoot on a little digital camera, and used lots of improvisation. We stick to the script, but also like to keep things spontaneous and fresh. As a result, dialog doesn’t feel mechanical, or rehearsed. Well, at least not all the time.

Shooting a scene with Puerto Rican actress, Joealis Santiago Filipetti. Thats me with my camara in hand!

I’m currently working on my next feature film, it will be called “Rio Piedras Mon Amour” and it will be about a cook who suddenly faces himself with the fact that he is job less, and doesn’t know what to do with his life. All that within the background of a country in chaos. The people in rebellion, strikes, government abuse and religion. Its gonna be kind of heavy thematically, but as you guys already know if you’ve been reading my blog, I love films that actually say something as opposed to empty, hollow films.

Didnt even have to build any sets to make the world look post apocalyptic!

On the side, I’m also working on a film called “Fase Delta” (Delta Phase) which is an anthology film made by three different directors…one of them is me. All three stories are focused on one theme: Insomnia. I’m currently shooting my half of the film, which will be a 15-20 minute short film about a guy who cant sleep because he is having nightmares about cops hitting people, and people in strikes, screaming and fighting and complaining…he is alone in his room during a stormy night. When the lights go out due to a power failure the main character will receive a visit from a very special individual. I should be over with the filming this week end. Wish me luck.

So anyways, just thought Id let you guys know a bit about who I am, plus it gives me a chance to post some pics of our filmmaking adventures!

As far as this blog goes, stick around, there are lots of good things coming along for readers of The Film Connoisseur. Next Monday we will begin a count down. It will be a a very special countdown done in collaboration between The Film Connoisseur and another blog that will be revealed on Monday! So be on the look out for that starting next week!

Again, thanks for the continued support to The Film Connoisseur! As Stan Lee -founder of Marvel Comics- has been known to say: “Ill keep writing, if you keep reading!”

Francisco Gonzalez

The Film Connoisseur

Alice (2009)

Title: Alice (2009)

Writer/Director: Nick Willing

Cast: Caterina Scorsone, Andrew Lee Potts, Kathy Bates, Harry Dean Stanton, Tim Curry, Matt Frewer

Review:

When you are a kid and you see Alice in Wonderland, you really have no idea what it’s about. At least that is what happened to me. As a child, I had seen countless versions of Lewis Carroll’s story on both television and film. But I never really knew what the hell the story was talking about. To me the story was just a fantasy tale that took place in a totally freaky world filled with talking cats, smoking caterpillars, and drinks and food that turned you big and small. Never did I go further than that. Watching Alice in Wonderland as an adult is a whole other story!

The version of Alice in Wonderland that I will be reviewing today is one that aired on the Syfy channel, it is called simply Alice. And essentially, it is an updated version of Lewis Carroll’s classic. Its more then just a facelift in special effects and story, this film turns wonderland into a futuristic wasteland that looks like it would fit better inside of a post apocalyptic film. On this version, Alice is a black belt in karate; she even has her own martial arts school. She is going out with this guy, and has invited him over for dinner so she could present him to her mom. But there’s something weird about this guy! He is hiding something, somebody is after him. But who? Before Alice knows it, her new boyfriend is kidnapped by a group of guys in white shirts and black suits, and taken away in a van. Soon, they drive up to a building and walk inside of a room that holds a special mirror. They jump into the mirror and disappear! Alice follows! From their on in, the film is about Alice trying to find her boyfriend, and her long lost father in wonderland. Will she ever escape this crazy post apocalyptic wonderland? Will she find her love, and her father?

This film, which was released as a two episode mini-series type of deal over the Syfi channel, comes to us from director Nick Willing. Nick Willing is not a house hold name as a director, but he has directed a few movies that you’ve probably seen like for example, Tin Man (2007), which was a modern take on L. Frank Baum’s The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. It was also released through the Syfy channel to rave reviews and ultra high raitings. The success of Tin Man was probably what propelled this new take on Alice in Wonderland. Willing even directed a version of Alice in Wonderland that was also a made for t.v. thing, it was released in 1999on NBC. So I guess the guy has done Alice in Wonderland twice! He was more than qualified to direct this new one.

But I welcome it, just as I welcome every new version of The Christmas Carol that comes out. I was pumped to see Burtons take on wonderland, thought I was ultimately disappointed. I’m looking forward to that new take on The Wizard of Oz that’s just around the corner. I love seeing new versions of old tales. Every Christmas, I watch a different version of The Christmas Carol. There’s enough of them for me to be doing that for a while. Some versions are good, some suck, but its always interesting to see how each new voice and vision sees the story. On this version, Wonderland has been devastated by the tyranny of evil rulers. The Evil Queen of Hearts is bleeding the land dry. On Alice, wonderland looks dreadful, lifeless, void of color and happiness. Except of course for the castle on which The Queen lives in which looks modern, clean and livable. The rebels live underground. Plotting a way to dethrone the evil queen and her army of Agent Smith’s. Surviving on whatever scraps they can find.

And that’s the thing about Alice in Wonderland. As a child, I never picked up on the rebellious/subversive nature of the story. It’s all about the rebels vs. the evil government that needs to be replaced. Why does it need to be replaced? Well, because the queen kidnaps people from our world, keeps them entertained in a casino, making them think they are winning the games. Unbeknownst (big word!) to the people, the floor of the casino is siphoning what ever emotions they are feeling, and bottling them all up in a factory below the casino, so these emotions can be consumed by the queen, and also sold on the black market. It’s an interesting idea, and a symbolism for how the powerful feed on the emotions of the masses and the control they have over them. Sucking the people dry, keeping them in a hypnotic state with hollow entertainment and drugs.

Like many subversive films, this one lets us know about the dangers of going against the big old powerful system. The moment you become conscious, and start thinking on your own they whisk you away to a mysterious psychiatric ward, where they then attempt to brainwash you all over again. The Queen has no sympathy for the people. No gratitude for being allowed to be up there governing. She only has that thirst for power. Of course the movie is all about going against that, fighting to recover our minds, freeing the people and bringing justice and peace to wonderland. They captured very well that feeling of paranoia, that you are being watched, that you must obey. That you must playball with the rules or its “off with his head” with you.

The White Rabbitt is a killer android on this version

Alice also has the science fiction element to it that I don’t think we had seen on any Alice in Wonderland film before. On this one, the white rabbit is a murderous gangster type robot that functions as The Queens own personal bounty hunter. There is this whole chase sequence in the film that takes place with Alice flying on these flying scooters that that look like flamingo’s. The men who work for The Queen look like Agent Smith from the Matrix movies. Wonderland looks like something out of I am Legend or something. Buildings upon buildings abandoned and destroyed. I enjoyed the sci-fi angle the series had. It gave this version its own unique look and feel.

The Mad Hatter and Alice fall in love on this one, and parts of the series are about them developing feelings for each other little by little, this love affair is what gives the film one of its worst sequences, the tacked on mega happy ending. But we have to remember that this series was made for T.V., and as such, it has to comply with a few things. Most important among them is having a happy ending. And stretching things out so you can have a two part mini-series. It’s really the only thing I didn’t like about this one, at times it felt like it was just streeetching things out. Still, in spite of these shortcomings, the movie proved to be entertaining for me. I’m curious for that other version of Alice in Wonderland that this director made way back in 1999, I never got around to seeing it. I’m also planning on seeing Tin Man soon, so expect a review of it. This was not the best Alice in Wonderland film ever made, but it was an entertaining and different take on the old tale. Certainly far more entertaining than Tim Burton’s recent 3-D abortion, sorry, I was really dissapointed by it.

Rating: 3 ½ out of 5

Contamination (1980)

Title: Contamination (1980)

Director: Luigi Cozzi

Writer: Luigi Cozzi, Erick Tomek

Cast: Ian McCulloch, Louise Marleau, Marino Mase

Review:

Fellow movie reviewer/blogger James, from the blog known as 42nd Street Cinema reviewed Luigi Cozzi’s Contamination a while back on his blog and it caught my attention for various reasons. First it’s an Italian sci-fi which means, low budget, corny dialog, bad dubbing, and the ripping off of some successful American film. That’s a formula for fun times if there ever was any. I enjoy that kind of film, there’s a charm to watching a cheesy b-movie. There is. I try to convince my girlfriend about the glories of watching a cheesy splatter fest, but alas, I've been very unsuccessful. Second, this film was made by Luigi Cozzi, the guy who directed those two Italian Hercules movies: Hercules (1983) and The Adventures of Hercules (1985) with Lou Ferigno. You want to know what a cheesy sword and sandal movie is like? Watch those two films! You could also watch Lucio Fulci’s Conquest (1983)! Wow there’s a cheese ball if there ever was one. Conquest is like a cheap version of Conan the Barbarian mixed with a little bit of Clash of the Titans! But I’m getting side tracked here. Back to Cozzi and Contamination! Cozzi also directed a film called Star Crash (1979) a film that I have been dying to see for the longest time. Unfortunately, it’s a hard movie to get a hold of! Meaning that its not on dvd yet. But Contamination is, and it’s the film Ill be reviewing today.

One of the alien eggs

The film starts off similarly to Lucio Fulci’s Zombie (1979) with an abandoned ship racing towards the shores of New York City. Umberto Lenzi’s Nightmare City (1980) starts the same way, but with a mysterious plane landing on an aiport. It’s the same type of premise. A seemingly empty boat/ship/plane is headed towards the city. What horrors will it hold inside? On Contamination, a crew of scientists/policemen go into the ship to investigate. As they descend deeper into the bowls of the ship, they discover bodies that have apparently been ripped to shreds. One of the scientist’s points out that they also look as if they had exploded from the inside. Point is, they are walking amongst grizzly dismembered human remains. So what do they do? They walk deeper into the boat! Sure, that’s the smartest thing to do! As they continue descending they come upon a slimy group of alien eggs which begin to pulsate and glow! Do the scientists and policemen leave? Do they consider this a dangerous situation? Nope. They decide to stick around and see what happens to these strange pulsating egg things. The eggs explode and spray them with its deadly contents. The alien slime that jettisons from the eggs has an interesting effect on humans. It makes them explode! And so they do. Most of the scientists and cops end up with their stomachs exploding violently! It’s up to the sole survivor of this grizzly event, a retired astronaut, and a female military Colonel to find the rest of the eggs that might be spread about the country. Will they find more eggs? Can they prevent the end of humanity? And just what kind of creature is laying these eggs?

I had lots of fun with this movie. To comply with Italian horror movie rule #557, this film is a rip off of a highly successful American film. That film is Ridley Scott’s Alien (1979). This, as is the case in many Italian horror films like Conquest (1983) Beyond the Door (1974) and 1999: The Bronx Warriors (1982) was entirely done on purpose to cash in on the success of the American film they are inspired by. I guess these Italian produces were simply trying to make their cash. Can’t say I blame them. They were trying to keep up with what was popular at the time. But I have to hand it to Cozzi who made a film that both satisfied the producers (giving them elements from Alien) and making a science fiction film that would satisfy him. Cozzi is a self professed lover of science fiction films. He’s whole life he had been trying to make one, and he did. Star Crash (1979) was a “big-budget” and ambitious science fiction film. A homage to 50’s sci-fi. By the way, Contamination is also a homage to 50’s science fiction film The Quatermass Experiment (1955) with all those scientists walking about with their special masks and suits.

But apparently, science fiction was seen at that time as a kiss of death by Italian film producers. They had no faith in sci-fi back in those days. So Cozzi had to rely on making science fiction films that were disguised as horror films. Again, in this way, he satisfies producers by giving them their horror film (that’s sure to make money) and making what he loves, a science fiction film. He did this with Contamination. It is equal times horror and science fiction. It takes place on earth, in this way reducing the costs of having to build any expensive sets, but eventually ends up being about aliens wanting to take over the earth. I think Conzzi needs to be congratulated for making this film in spite of budgetary constraints. Something is really strange about this movie. It was influenced by Alien, but when you look at it, it feels more like James Cameron’s Aliens (1986). I believe that Cameron maybe saw both Alien and Contamination as a kid, and was influenced by it when he was writing Aliens. Contamination even has a “alien queen” laying the eggs in the ending of the film! They burn the eggs with a flame thrower! The queen is a giant monster they face off in the end. Of course, Contatmination didn’t have the production values that Cameron’s Aliens had, but hey, I’m just sayin the similarities are there.

The cave in which the alien eggs are hidden in

It similarities with Ridley Scott’s Alien are extremely evident. It has that whole backstory about being finding alien eggs on a distant unexplored planet. On Contamination, the eggs are found during an expedition to Mars. Somehow the eggs end up going back to earth and for some reason, they are spreading around the city of New York. Cool thing about these alien eggs is that when they explode, whoever’s around them gets sprayed by this green alien juice and then they explode to smithereens! This movie was banned in a couple of countries because of the stomach exploding sequences. Gotta hand it to these guys, the stomach exploding scenes are a highlight of this flick, they give the film its uniqueness. The production crew decided to use real animal innards in some scenes, so expect an additional gram of gruesomeness on this one. By the way Romero did the same thing on Day of the Dead (1985). He used real animal intestines during those scenes in which Captain Rhodes is ripped to shreds by the hoards of zombies.

There might be some spoilers ahead. If you are feeling adventurous go on and read them. Contamination is the kind of film that ends with a giant creature that the protagonists have to confront and obviously destroy by the films climax. It joins the ranks amongst other films that also end with slimy, tentacled creatures like Slither (2006), Jack Brooks Monster Slayer (2007) and Society (1989). Movies with one big static creature that is deadly, even though it really doesn’t move that much because the budget didn’t allow for more. Cozzi wanted to use stop motion animation for the Alien Cyclops that appears at the end of this movie, but he was prohibited to do so by his producers. So he had to make do with an animatronic beast that doesn’t really move much. Still, with the help of some crafty editing, and cleverly shot sequences, the alien creature ended up being a pretty cool creature. It made me remember films like John Carpenter’s The Thing (1982) or the Freddy Worm that tries to swallow Patricia Arquette whole in Nightmare on Elm Street III: The Dream Warriors (1987).

The Alien Cyclops! Stare at its hypnotic eye!

There are other pluses in the film. The music was made by legendary Italian band Goblin, who as some of you may know scored a great number of Italian Horror films. Most of Dario Argento’s films had a score by Goblin. So did Lucio Fulci movies. So that’s definitely a plus for this one, giving the film that distinctive Italian horror movie feel. It also stars Ian McCulloch, whom some of you might remember from Lucio Fulci’s City of the Living Dead (1980) and Zombie (1979). He plays a drunken, pissed off retired astronaut who says lines like: “What else do you want to know about me?! How many times I screw!?” So that’s my take on Luigi Cozzi’s Contamination. Make no mistakes about it, this is an Italian splatter fest, with both is pro’s and con’s. It’s a B-Movie every step of the way and yes, it’s a rip of a bigger budgeted American production. But hey, it’s still a supremely fun watch. If you’re in the mood for cheap Italian rip off’s that still manages to retain its entertainment value then look no further then this. And if you have a copy of Star Crash that you can swing my way, contact me please! I’m dying to see that movie!

Rating: 3 out of 5